How did she recognise me?

THE GALLERY FROM VIEW MAHMUD JEGA

Politicians in Nigeria said several things last week that reminded me of a story told many years ago on a BBC radio program. It said a man who robbed a bank was arrested just outside the bank, with a gun, and with the loot still in his hands. It looked like an open and shut case but when he was charged to court and convicted, he appealed the conviction. His one ground of appeal was that a prosecution witness, a female bank clerk from whom he seized the money, identified him in the dock. The enraged robber said, “How could she identify me? I was wearing a mask when I did the job!”

Minister of the Federal Capital Territory FCT Nyesom Wike, probably the most voluble man of power on the Nigerian political scene right now, said on a Channels TV program last week that he loves money. He was defending his lifestyle, characterized by ownership of a Rolls Royce limousine, the ultimate sign of luxury transport all over the world. Even the US President’s Lincoln Continental, known as “The Beast,” is better known for security than for opulence.

Wike said, “I like money. Nobody can do without money. You cannot say because I said I need money to solve problems, therefore I am corrupt. No. I need money to pay my children’s school fees. I need money for my family’s healthcare. Does that make me corrupt? No.” To begin with, it is not true that nobody can do without money. Monks living in some Buddhist monasteries in Vietnam, Thailand and Cambodia almost never touch money as part of their codes of modesty and chastity. All they own in their lives is the simple cloth they wear and a begging bowl.

If the money one needs is to pay his children’s school fees and his family’s hospital bills, how much money is that, even by today’s Nigerian conditions where private school fees and private hospital bills have sky rocketed? How does that justify driving around in a Rolls Royce or a Mercedes 600? Now, that, is money.  Nigerians make excuses for businessmen who live in opulence, but not public officers, who must avoid the appearance of corruption. Even some of the world’s richest businessmen know that modesty is a virtue; Warren Buffet of the great investment firm Berkshire Hathaway has lived in a three-bedroom house in Omaha, Nebraska since 1953 and he drives a very old car.

Actually, modesty, not opulence, is the stuff of greatness. The late Malam Dalhatu Bayero told a story, that when he was Group Managing Director of Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation [NNPC] in the 1990s, he received the President of an international oil firm. As they drove from Lagos airport into the city, the American oil man was impressed by the dilapidated danfo buses and other wrecked vehicles sputtering on the streets. He thought it was great stuff; he said to Bayero, “Oh, lovely! Nigerians really love antique vehicles!” The NNPC boss smiled inwardly and thought, “Which antique vehicles? It is because we do not have money.” Will the American oil man, quite likely a billionaire, had been so impressed if he saw Mr. Wike’s Rolls Royce on Lagos streets?

Today, nearly 70 years since his death, Mahatma Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi is renown all over the world, even though he wore the simplest loin cloth and dragged his goat around so that he could drink its milk. When Muammar Gaddafi ruled Libya for 42 years, he lived in a tent in Bab Aziza Barracks outside Tripoli. When US President Ronald Reagan sent planes to bomb him in 1986, they identified Gaddafi’s tent because he had a camel and goats tied nearby because his breakfast was dates, camel and goat milk. It would have been much easier for US Strategic Bomber Command to identify a Rolls Royce in a Port Harcourt garage than a goat in the desert.

And, what becomes of the need for leaders to set examples? All around people are complaining of high food prices, high transport fares, unaffordable medical bills and school fees etc. How does it look when leaders ride around in the most luxurious cars, while at the same time urging impoverished citizens to gird their loins, make more sacrifices and wait for the good times to return? Even if Minister Wike was from a comfortable background as he said, with his father owning one of the few duplex houses in the community, having been a public servant for the last three decades, he ought to worry about public perception. And also not spilling words that injure citizens’ psyche.

And also setting good examples. For example, when former Sokoto State Governor and ADC chieftain Aminu Waziri Tambuwal was asked last week whether he has quit his membership of PDP, he reportedly said, “We’re still members of PDP, and we’re going nowhere, but we will work for ADC.” Before anyone could say that is absurd, Tambuwal said he is only borrowing a template from Minister Wike, who sits smugly in the APC Federal Cabinet, while his legislative and other supporters in Rivers all defected to APC, but he still claims to be a PDP member and in fact is said to control its top national officials. He recently consolidated his gains by forcing the party’s governors to reinstate his associate, Samuel Anyanwu, as PDP national secretary. Ok, so that is the new template in Nigerian politics, running with the hare and hunting with the hound. In the olden days, such a posture will quickly earn you expulsion from the party on charges of anti-party activity. Two years after his governorship tenure ended, Tambuwal is still the leader of PDP in Sokoto State and none of its members has as yet raised a finger after seeing him prominently at last week’s ADC meeting. It is the Wike template, after all.

The gale of endorsements of “sole candidates” for primary elections that are a year away continued at the weekend when the South South Zonal Congress of APC adopted President Tinubu and four APC governors in the zone as sole candidates in next year’s primaries. The governors of Cross River, Akwa Ibom, Delta and Edo were endorsed as sole candidates, even though Governor Monday Okpebholo hardly needs any endorsement, with more than three years to go in tenure. The zonal congress also urged the remaining non-APC South South governors, of Rivers and Bayelsa, to quickly defect to APC, with the broad hint that they could also benefit from this early endorsement. It is possible that Governor Simi Fubara, who APC and Presidency hold by the jugular, will accept the offer as his tenure insurance policy.

Like the British bank robber who protested at his identification by a bank clerk despite his wearing a mask, these early endorsements also wear a political mask and do not believe their sycophantic motives will be recognized by party members. What are people in politics for, if not to contest for elective offices? It reminds me of an event in 2000 AD, when Zamfara PDP chieftains met at the Mairuwa Dam resort in nearby Katsina State to deliberate on the upcoming local government elections in their state. Some chieftains advocated a boycott, saying ANPP-controlled state government of Governor Ahmed Sani will rig them. One party elder however stood up. He said, “To a political party and a politician, contesting elections is like five daily prayers to a Muslim. You have no other work higher than that.” When party structures and officials endorse sole candidates ahead of primaries, then what is the use of primaries and what are other aspirants supposed to do?

Early endorsement is a dangerous political gamble. Even some of the greatest politicians in Nigeria once paid a price for early endorsements. Before UPN’s 1983 primaries, party leader Chief Obafemi Awolowo had no challenge as presidential candidate. He however extended the same gesture to the party’s five governors, endorsing them to run for second terms. Overwhelming as Awo was, that decision did not go down well with many aspirants, and it precipitated rebellions especially by deputy governors of Oyo and Ondo States. Maybe no one from within APC will contest against President Tinubu in the party’s primaries next year, but there is real possibility that the same endorsement gesture will soon be extended to APC governors. In some states at least, that will trigger defections to other parties. Besides, if no one contests against President Tinubu in the primaries does not necessarily speak well of internal democracy in APC, because in 2003, overwhelming as President Obasanjo was, some aspirants ran against him at the PDP convention.  

And then, at the weekend, Minister of Power Adebayo Adelabu toured Oyo and Ogbomosho areas of Oyo State, declared his intention to run for Governor in 2027 and sought their support. He is probably the first person anywhere in the country to openly declare a governorship ambition so early in the day. Some social media activists quickly said, “No wonder that power supply is epileptic and Band A customers are loudly complaining. The man in charge, instead of visiting Gencos, transmission lines and Discos, he is there campaigning for governor. How will there be light in this situation? Or has he diverted all the power to Oyo State as part of his campaign?”

Adelabu has reason to be in a hurry. Governor Makinde is in his final term and must vacate office in 2027. Besides, he belongs to PDP, so an APC man has no scruples in openly coveting his seat at this point. Besides, he will say to those Nigerians who are making allegations against him about the power sector, “How did you recognize me? I was wearing a politician’s mask when I went on those early campaigns.”